Authors are contesting publisher and agent claims on payouts from Anthropic’s $1.5B copyright settlement.

The fund covers about 500,000 eligible titles at roughly $3,000 each, with non-education works defaulting to a 50/50 author-publisher split.

Sole rightsholders can claim 100%, and the Authors Guild says authors whose rights reverted before August 10, 2022 may qualify, depending on contract terms.

Authors are now reporting publishers claiming rights-reverted works or 100% of in-print awards that would normally be split.

In the underlying case, the court granted Anthropic summary judgment that training on the named authors’ books was fair use, while piracy remained a separate damages issue.

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techcrunch .com/2026/09/06/authors-push-back-as-publishers-and-agents-seek-share-of-anthropic-settlement